I assume you are using the Red/White/Yellow ("composite video"). Cables. And the Yellow cable is connected to a yellow jack on both the roku and a TV. If this is the case, and you have tried a different cable, perhaps your roku is broken. Although I have never heard of this problem. The black and white problem could happen if you were connecting the video (yellow) cable to the wrong jacks. Its important that you use the yellow jacks.

If you know someone else that has a roku, you could take your box to their house, and plug their cables into your roku (just swap theirs for yours), that would tell you if it is a roku box issue or a cable / tv issue.

If you are using componenent (the cable that has red/green/blue connectors), if you plug the cable into the wrong jacks on the TV, it can appear black and white.

just wanted to say that i tried to use a sony camcorder white-red-yellow rca to miniplug cable with my roku xds and samsung hdtv and it did not work. (Yes, I tried all 6 possible plug positions).

I don't understand why roku advertises the xds as having component out capablilty and yet does not include the very obscure cable required to make it work. I paid a price premium for the component output and now will have to mail order the part to make it work. LAME!

just wanted to say that i tried to use a sony camcorder white-red-yellow rca to miniplug cable with my roku xds and samsung hdtv and it did not work. (Yes, I tried all 6 possible plug positions).

I don't understand why roku advertises the xds as having component out capablilty and yet does not include the very obscure cable required to make it work. I paid a price premium for the component output and now will have to mail order the part to make it work. LAME!

-warren g

a white/red/yellow cable is a composite cable, not component. Just because it has 3 ends doesn't mean it works the same.

I thought the benefit of component was that it separated out the various parts of the image to allow for a higher throughput of data to the TV, plus the wires were thick enough to allow for better transmission as well. Wouldn't having all that data going through a 3.5mm jack create a horrible bottleneck and eliminate the benefits? Doesn't seem very efficient to me. It could be interesting to do a comparison of the older boxes with dedicated component outputs vs this special cable... both a visual test by playing the same picture side-by-side simultaneously, and a technical test using an oscilliscope or other testing equipment.

NNot for throughput just less processing. One doesn't have to seperate the luminance from the chroma. This way it's one for you.

I thought the benefit of component was that it separated out the various parts of the image to allow for a higher throughput of data to the TV, plus the wires were thick enough to allow for better transmission as well. Wouldn't having all that data going through a 3.5mm jack create a horrible bottleneck and eliminate the benefits? Doesn't seem very efficient to me. It could be interesting to do a comparison of the older boxes with dedicated component outputs vs this special cable... both a visual test by playing the same picture side-by-side simultaneously, and a technical test using an oscilliscope or other testing equipment.

I agree, this whole 3 component wires into 1 wire thing has me confused... it seems like it is going in the opposite direction in terms of quality... there are 3 wires for a reason... I've never heard of this single wire component cable before, until Roku put it on their new boxes.

I trust Roku, so I'm not quite calling "flower" - yet, but I do find it a little strange.

It's not one wire. There are three wires within the bundle. Look at the male jack and you'll see that there's more than one channel of video. Remember no audio goes through this cable.

There is a note that the cable doesn't have the chip to convert digital signals to analog signals, so it only fits for the devices which itself can convert digital signals to analog signals, for example SET TOP BOX (STB)...

Or, I've already got an HDMI to DVI cable hooked into the TV for using my laptop - Would the Roku output sound through the standard RCA's on the composite cables when HDMI is being used?